Karma Always Comes Back Around
by Da Sluggo
Summary: What happens when everyone's favorite thief manages to steal something from every Titan. . .including Raven?


Quick author's note and comment:

First off, thank you Wordbearer for being my beta reader. I really needed it, as you well know.

Secondly, disclaimers. I do **NOT** own DC, Teen Titans, or (sadly) Red X. I just like to take them out and play around with them.

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I was going to pull off the best heist in the History of Jump City.

No, I wasn't going to steal that priceless painting by Botticelli. No, I wasn't going to try and steal all of the red and black sports cars from Jump City's top car dealership.

I felt that I had received a somewhat higher calling.

I was going to break into Titans Tower, and steal something valuable from each and every Titan.

Crazy, you say? Loony, even?

Phfft...naturally.

**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**

By the time it was midnight the following evening, I had already stolen one of Cyborg's spare arms, Robin's cape, Beast Boy's toy monkey, and Starfire's favorite bottle of mustard. Everything I had taken had been from their rooms, snatched while they slept on, oblivious.

Now, the only Titan left was Raven.

I hot wired her door, and opened it manually. I was able to pry it open with little or no sound, which I considered to be a blessing.

I dropped silently to my stomach, and peeked around the corner of the door.

I can honestly say that room gave me the heebie-jeebies.

Even if the lights had been on (did this chick even _have_ lights?) it would have still been a very dark room. There was only one widow, which faced to the south. The walls were painted a dark color, I think maybe blue or purple. Theatre masks hung from one wall, and there was a triangular bookcase up against another.

And farthest from the door, was a big circular bed. I could see a small lump under the ebony covers, and I assumed that it was Raven herself.

I tiptoed inside, and nosed around, considering what to take.

She had a lot of books, but which one would she miss the most? There was a vanity hand mirror on her dresser, with small red jewels encrusted into the handle.

But then I thought that Raven didn't really seem the type to primp all that much, thus the mirror probably wouldn't be missed.

And then, I saw _it._

It was...well, I don't even know how to really describe it. It was small. It was white.

It had on a fork hat.

It's purple-pink eyes gazed up at me from Raven's bedside table, blinking sleepily. I cocked my head curiously at it, a mental question mark forming above my head.

What was this thing? Where did it come from?

I shook my head, clearing away the questions.

If that thing was that close to Raven while she slept, it must have had to have meant something to the girl. I reached out, and gently grabbed the fluffy white thing.

It let out a small squeak, like the type you hear from a dog toy, but then fell silent.

I quickly stuff it inside a small duffle bag that I had stuffed the rest of the Titans stuff into, and then left the Tower.

**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**

I stopped at the City Park a few hours later, deciding to take a breather and look for a worthy hiding place for my bounty.

"Hm..." I said, looking at a grove of trees off to the far left. "That should do it."

"**Do it! Sha Lah!"**

I jump, and look around frantically for a few seconds before I realize that the sound came from _inside_ my bag.

Cautiously, I open the top and peek inside.

It's the forkhat. It stares up at me, slowly blinking it's pink eyes. It hops a little inside the bag, and continues to stare at me.

I shrug my shoulders, close the bag again, and head off into the grove, leaves crunching softly under my boots.

"Whatever. It's none of my business."

"**Whatever!"**

"**Business!"**

"**SHA LAH!"**

I break into a run as I reach the grove, and I slide to the leafy ground, opening the sack as I do so.

Two (count 'em, two) forkhats flopped out of the sack.

I scratch my head as they both stare up at me. I could have sworn...never mind, I think, shaking my head. I grab them both (**"Whee! Sha Lah!"**) and stuff them back into the sack.

I quickly find what I'm looking for, a hollowed out tree. I stuff the bag inside, and turn to go.

"OUCH!" I landed (hard) on my chest, my feet apparently stuck on something.

"**Ouch! Sha Lah!" **

I turn to glare at them, and find myself face to face with _five _of them. They were all huddled around my feet, gazing at me innocently.

"Grrr...Let me go!"

"**Go! Don't Go! Sha Lah!"**

'Oh, deliver me, Henry More Smith,' I silently prayed.

I wretch my feet from their grasps, stand, and brush myself off. I glare down into their pink eyes, silently wishing they'd just go and be good little forkhats and stay inside the tree until the Titans found them.

As I keep my eye on them, I start walking out of the grove. They all make a small squeak, and start to follow, hopping after me.

"Oh no you don't!" I send my net at them, gathering them all up (**Don't! Sha Lah!**), tie the net up tightly, and stuff them back into their tree.

"And stay in there!"

"**Stay! Sha Lah!"**

As I work at keeping them in their tree, my mind is in overdrive.

_Okay,_ I thought to myself. _Can they reproduce Asexually? Do they produce a hallucinogen that makes me _think_ there's more than one? Damn it, I wish I knew more about alien biology..._

Finished with putting the forkhats in their tree home, I start running, glancing back now and then to make sure they weren't following me.

I felt the air leave my lungs as I collided with something solid, and I fell to the ground with an 'Oomph!'

As I shake my head clear, and I look up, I suddenly wish I was anywhere but here.

Raven is standing above me, cloak billowing out as she floats gently above the leaf-strewn ground. She lowers her hooded head down to stare at me, her eyes appearing bored and uncaring.

"You should watch where you're going. It's a dangerous city for thieves like you."

I wince, and slowly climb back to my feet, unconsciously wiping the leaves off of me.

"Yeah yeah, tell me about it Witch. Just make sure you don't get burned at the stake."

Raven lowers herself gently to the ground, pointedly ignoring my comment. She stares at me, face impassive.

I sigh, and put my fists up. "So, just came for some rough and tumble huh? Can we just skip it? I'm really tired. . ."

"I bet," she drones. "I felt someone in the Tower. Someone who didn't _belong_ there." She glares at me now. "And I think it was you."

"Pfft..." I lower my hands from in front of my mask and instead cross them across my chest.

"I thought you were just the Witch. Not the Detective, like Batsy Boy Junior."

"I'm not. However, this 'witch' has a few powers that Robin doesn't even know about." Her eyes suddenly glow grayish-white. "And if you don't cooperate, I _will_ use them."

I shake my head, and give a somewhat halting laugh. "And what does my Enchantress," I give a small bow towards her, "Want with my talents?"

"I want you to give back what you've stolen."

I give a sincere laugh this time. "Oh, Raven! You're hilarious!" I force myself to stop, and take a deep breath. "Honestly, what makes you think I stole _anything_?"

Raven's face goes from blank to a frown in less than a second. "You're a lowlife thief. Of course you stole something. And I want them back. . ." she holds out her petite hand, "_NOW."_

I lean back against the tree, ignoring the alarm bells going off inside my head.

"You got nothing on me except history. Boy Blunder won't approve of this."

Raven gives me a small smile. "What Robin doesn't know won't hurt him."

_Oh, crud. Please let her be joking._

_Does Raven even _do_ funny!_

"Okay then," I say, leaving my post and starting to circle around her, secretly looking for a swift way out. "What do you have in mind?"

She's all business now. "You give me back what you stole, and I'll let you go scotch free."

"Lemme think about this . . . Um, NO!" I pause in front of her, blocking the tree where the forkhats are hidden. "Go back to your cauldron Witch, and send the _real_ heroes after me -"

She cut me off in mid sentence. With an animalistic snarl, she telekinetically grabbed me by my throat and slammed me into a tree. I winced, and hissed in pain as my back protested to this barbaric treatment.

I went limp, pretending to pass out. I heard Raven snarl again, and felt her mental grip on me slacken.

I used it to my advantage. I reached into my utility belt, snatched an X, and let it fly at Raven.

I had intended for it to be a Sticky X, sticking to her mouth and eyes so she couldn't really fight me.

It turned out that I had accidentally grabbed a different kind of X. I watched in horror as Raven ducked it's whirring pass, laughing hysterically as she came back up.

_Raven doesn't seem the type to _laugh. . .

"_You think you can hit me with that pathetic little toy!"_

"Um...actually..."

"_FOOL!" _She snarled, her eyes flashing crimson. I started to back away from her, bumping into the tree with the forkhats in it.

Raven's demeanor had taken an abrupt turnaround. No longer was she the monotone witch with purple eyes and a bored expression. Her eyes had gone a dark crimson, and her voice was deeper, and more sinister sounding. Demonic, almost.

"_I will rip you into tiny little pieces,"_ she was whispering now, gliding towards me as she did. _"Then, I will feed you piece by little piece to Beast Boy, telling him it's just fish food."_

I mentally gagged at the picture she was painting in my mind. Very creative, and very grotesque.

Raven slid closer and closer, catching my eyes as she did. It was like the Titan had hypnotized me. I couldn't move, even though my brain was howling at my legs to start running like mad.

It was like watching a cobra coming slowly towards you. You knew it was dangerous, but you couldn't help it. You just continue to watch it slither closer and closer to your doom...

She leers nastily at me, leaning in so close to me I start to shiver from a little fear.

"Back off," I almost stutter. "Psychopathic little witch. . ."

"I am Rage. And I will Consume her, as well as you."

"**Consume! Sha Lah!"**

Raven and I both freeze, minds going blank as the little forkhats finally made their presence known.

"_So. . . you _did _take them. I knew it,"_ Raven hissed. _"You lying little thief! You will pay for this, by Trigon -"_

I decided that I only had two options. Beg for forgiveness, or I could suck up my gut and die like a man.

I was unable to complete my decision-making. There was a small whirring sound in the air, and my X came back, bonking Raven on the back of her head and knocking her hood off of her head.

The red glow in her eyes immediately left, returning once more to wide violet. She let a small gasp escape her lips before falling to the ground, her violet hair curtaining her face from me.

I gasped as well, and leaned back against the tree trunk for support. I looked from the X to Raven and then back to the X.

"I have a Boomerang X?"

"**X! Sha Lah!"**

I snarl as I turn towards the forkhats that are watching from the hole in the trunk.

"I've had enough of you bunch! I'm taking all of you guys' back, and leaving you in Raven's Room."

"**Raven! Sha Lah!"**

As I gathered up the forkhats as well as the rest of the Titan's stuff, I glanced back down at an unmoving Raven.

Hm...Now what to do with _her_ ?

**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**

Raven sat up in bed, panting. That had been a very vivid and weird dream. Red X, the thief, had come into Titan's Tower and stolen a few things. Her forkhat included.

She glanced at her bedside table, feeling vaguely relieved to see that her precious masseuse was still there, blinking a pair of pink eyes at her.

Raven sighs, falling back into bed and looking out her window from her pillow. It was almost sunrise, she could see water graying. . .

Her eyes widening, she leaps out of bed, and scrambles to the window.

There is a note on it, written in a handwriting she's not familiar with. . .

_Hey Sweet Cheeks,_

_Listen, I wanted to apologize for last night. I didn't mean to make you go all crazy on my ass and try to kill me. I was just bored and wanted something to do. I never hurt your little forkhats, as you can well see. Funny little buggers, actually. Did you know they can 'splice' themselves and then put themselves back together? Pretty neat to watch._

_You'll find that the Titans won't notice anything. I replaced all their stuff as well. I refilled Starfire's bottle and changed the tune to Beast Boy's monkey toy._

_Also, feeling particularly creative, I dyed Robin's cape a different color. Maybe it'll make you laugh._

_Fish Bait_

Raven snorted as she finished the note. Okay, so it wasn't a dream.

Raven dressed in her normal uniform, and levitated to the kitchen, intent on some good herbal tea.

What she found was, to her, rather immature and loud.

Beast Boy was crying, holding his toy monkey, which was singing The Barney Song.

Starfire's eyes were glowing green with righteous fury because her mustard bottle was filled with ketchup instead of mustard.

But to top it all off, Robin was visibly fuming with rage. Raven couldn't really blame him.

She'd be ticked off too if her favorite cloak had been dyed a hot pink.

Through all the yelling, screaming, crying, and explosions, no one noticed that Raven was doing something she rarely did.

She was smiling. Happy that she was with her friends.

And, all she had to do was go back to her room to have a world class massage to help get rid of the headache all of her friends would inevitably cause.

"**The End! Sha Lah!"**

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End file.
